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27 January 2013

Securing the future while Boeing won in 2012 on aircraft new orders. Airbus has a backlog for 8 years of production.

Aircraft
sales fell in 2012, as the company had predicted. It blamed the fall in new
orders, down from 1,419 in 2011 to 914 in 2012, on customers choosing to
purchase aircraft from Boeing. Its market share on new orders fell from 64% in
2011 to 41% in 2012.

John Leahy,
chief operating officer at Airbus, slammed Boeing over its unstable production
pattern.

Mr Leahy said
that Airbus has managed to stabilize and
keep increasing levels of production, even when order levels drop, as it
has created a backlog of work so that it can continually increase production
levels.

Airbus has a
backlog of 4,700 aircraft, which equates to eight years worth of production.

“Don’t paint
us with the same brush as Boeing,” he said. “We have taken the cycle out. The
cycle isn’t there as production doesn’t drop when orders drop.”

Airbus said that it will target the
Asian market, commercial jet lessors, and airlines in the US. Leahy believes Airbus can make
headway in the US market after authorities declared some of the subsidies
provided to Boeing and US airlines as unfair and requested that amendments be
made to level the playing field.

“We are
pleased to see that the European Commission has taken steps to address this
important issue,” said Mr Bregier on the new rules given to Boeing regarding
subsidies.

“Hopefully
there will be some international progress and this will help us to sell lower
range aircraft in the US,” he added.

Based on the
article “Airbus to create 300 UK jobs” published in The Manufacturer